


Fireside

by singtome



Series: Polaris [4]
Category: The Maze Runner (Movies), The Maze Runner Series - James Dashner
Genre: All other characters but Minho and Gally are just mentioned, Fluff, Gally is Useless and Minho takes care of him, Light Angst, M/M, Minho has a lot of emotions he doesn't know what to do with, Sickfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-20
Updated: 2018-02-20
Packaged: 2019-03-21 15:04:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,915
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13743465
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/singtome/pseuds/singtome
Summary: Something that Minho has learnt about Gally, not the easy way, is that he will not ask for help. Not even on his deathbed.(Or: Gally is sick and Minho plays nurse.)





	Fireside

**Author's Note:**

> Title and lyrics by Arctic Monkeys.
> 
> Takes place during Fahrenheit.

there's  this  image  of

you    and     I,     and

it  goes  dancing   by

in   the morning  and

in   the   night    time

 

   i.

Something that Minho has learnt about Gally, not the easy way, is that he will not ask for help. Nor do anything to help himself, for that matter, even on his deathbed. Which, quite honestly, isn’t too far off from the current situation.

What should have been a simple cold that would heal up in a few days with bed rest and fluids and, you know, basic self-care, has turned into a substantial case of influenza sub-grouped with a high fever, light-headedness, wracking coughs, and the general inability to leave the house.

Brilliant.

All this at the fault of pure stubbornness and an acute case of hypochondria. Minho had taken one look at the lump of a human being cocooned under a mountain of blankets – which are probably doing more bad than good – and decided enough was enough. This is how he finds himself tossing as many over-the-counter drugs and vitamins and whatever-the-fuck-else remedies he’s learnt from Thomas’ many (many many) visits to the doctor’s office, into his cart, brow pinched in annoyance.

It was either this or figure out a way to con Gally into his car or dragging him to Clint by the tips of his ears, and, unfortunately, neither scenario is one that Minho sees ending well for any of the parties involved.

The girl behind the counter spares him one curious but wildly unconcerned eyebrow raise at the assortment of health in a box scattered across the bench top before ringing him up, and Minho walks back through the doors in a worse mood than he started off with.

He runs into Thomas out the front of the supermarket, because the universe takes some perverse pleasure in torturing him as Thomas, ever perceptive, takes one look at the white paper bag in Minho’s had and the weary look on his face and immediately turned all doe-eyed. Minho affectionately tells him to fuck off.

 

   ii.

Gally’s house, when he reaches it, is a sight to behold. Windows shut, curtains drawn, at least one miscellaneous item of clothing strewn across every surface, and the stench of stale so strong that it is driven down to sheer willpower that Minho does not immediately pass out from lack of oxygen.

Minho takes a moment, asking for strength, and sets to work at airing out the place. Chances are the homeowner himself is passed out in his room – Minho can picture it; limbs sprawled lazily across the bed, sheets bare and rumbled and half on the floor, mumbling and groaning and all-round feeling sorry for himself. He rolls his eyes, ignoring the fond smile that tickles the corners of his mouth, and slides open a window.

 

   iii.   

He finds Gally just as he’d imagined, a lump of a human being bundled under the covers like a burrowing forest animal, feet and nest of hair sticking out from each end. The room is quiet enough to hear wheezing breaths and the occasional sniffle. Minho sighs and approaches the bed, hesitating only a moment before scooting across the mattress to sit cross-legged before Gally and, bag of goodies and water at the ready, he gently shakes him awake.

He is rewarded with a groan and a weak, sleepy shrug. “Gally,” he whispers, pushing a little firmer, “Hey, wake up.”

The first thing to emerge is a single eye, dark eyelashes against flushed, shiny freckled skin, a sliver of a green iris peeking up at Minho in a dazed manner. Minho raises his eyebrows and encourages – see: _forces_ – the blankets down to Gally’s chest, which is covered in a sweat-stained t-shirt that looks like it hasn’t been washed in days. He immediately curses and presses the back of his hand to Gally’s forehead.

“Shit,” he hisses, “You’re burning up.”

Gally closes his eyes against the welcomed coolness of Minho’s hand against his over-heated skin, humming. Minho swears again and pulls the covers the rest of the way off. This is met with more of a protesting moan.

“Dude,” Minho glares, “You look like something crawled up through your asshole and died.”

Gally presses his face into the pillow, “Nice to see you, too.”

Minho rolls his eyes and chooses, for the sake of his own sanity if not for anything else, to ignore him. “You need a shower,” he says, “and some actual food. When was the last time you ate?”

Gally groans and attempts to roll away and fall back asleep. Minho keeps a firm hold on his shoulder. “Don’t remember.”

Which translates to; the last time Minho was here. Great. _Perfect_. He rubs at his temples, feeling a headache coming on. He tells Gally to wait and leaves him weakly pawing for the covers again. He returns a couple minutes later with a damp cloth and a glass of orange juice. Gally allows Minho to manhandle him for a while, sipping the juice obediently until he is deemed fit to stand, let alone walk. He guides Gally to the bathroom and leaves him stripped to his underwear in the middle of the room, lukewarm spray hissing against the shower curtain behind him.

Tapping awkwardly on the door frame, Minho says, “Alright, try not to slip and break your neck. I’m gonna go make lunch. Hope you like sandwiches because that’s all you’re getting – yeah, no tomatoes, I know.” He shuts the door with Gally blinking at him, confused expression pinching his eyebrows together. Minho’s cheeks burn as he walks to the kitchen, stomach churning with something he either can’t place or doesn’t want to.

 

   iv.

He deposits the food along with some aspirin and the best over-the-counter cold and flu meds money can buy before a cleaner and fresher Gally ten minutes later, who eyes them suspiciously and most ungratefully.

Minho meets his eyes with an unimpressed glare and states, simply, “Eat.”

Gally groans, eyes fluttering shut in annoyance, “I’m fine.”

Minho nods and begins to stand. Dusting imaginary dirt off his pants, he baits, “Well, in that case, I’ll just go.”

Gally eats the sandwich, lip curled and nose wrinkled.

Ten minutes later Minho has inhaled his own sandwich in half the time it has taken Gally to get even near to finishing his. Chin resting in a palm, Minho remarks, “You need to eat. Build your strength and get better.”

“Why?” Gally mumbles around a mouthful of bread, miserably.

“So that you can be a functioning member of society?”

“What if I don’t want to?”

Minho blinks, apathetic. “Are you actually five years old?” he says. “I’m not going to be your wet nurse forever, dipshit. Get better so you can take care of your own ass.”

With one final gulp, Gally tosses the leftover crusts onto the plate and pushes it a safe distance away from him. Slouching back into his chair, he sniffs and mumbles something unintelligible.

“What?”

Gally clears his throat, poking at the edge of the plate, “I said I’m sorry I’m such a burden.”

Minho frowns, and begins, “No, that’s not – ” but stops, sensing the futility in the air.

He sighs.

Gally sneezes.

 

   v.

Later, when they’re lying on the couch after Gally’s fever had returned, some movie Minho hasn’t been following along with playing very low, he taps a steady rhythm against his knee and tries to focus on breathing.

It is at times like this, right here, when he could actually understand why Newt and Thomas delve into their other lives. He could picture it, just for a moment, simply to escape everything that is going on in _this_ one. That, of course, he will never tell a soul.

A Minho blinks out of existence faster than he appeared behind the static of the television screen when Gally’s toes poke into the skin of Minho’s thighs, and he turns to see his friend? boyfriend? current bedmate? adjust the damp cloth on his forehead and smile at him sheepishly.

He is pale and flushed and the skin under his eyes glow a sickly purple. He looks _so damn awful._

Gally says, voice low and husky not in a good way, “I figured out a reason to get better.”

And.

Minho doesn’t always want to strangle him, though sometimes …

“And what is that?” Minho asks.

Gally pokes at his leg again and grins, eyes blinking slowly like he could fall asleep at any moment, and he says, “’S that you’ll kiss me again.”

Minho tries to laugh, but it is too stiff and a beat too late to feel even close to genuine, but Gally is so out of it he doubts he even notices. “Don’t be an idiot,” he mutters eventually.

It takes Gally so long to answer Minho thinks he’s fallen asleep, “But I’m already an idiot,” he slurs, “Isn’t that what you always tell me?”

Minho rolls his eyes and shuffles on the couch, irritably, “Don’t be _more_ of an idiot. Your body won’t be able to handle all that. You’ll combust, and I don’t really feel like cleaning.”

This earns him a firmer shove, which reassures him, only a little.

 

   vi.

Minho tries to focus on the movie, he really does, but in the corner of his eye, a Minho and a Gally wrap themselves around each other like they’re meant to, like they aren’t afraid to, like all they know is each other and all they ever want is each other. They kiss and laugh into the other’s mouths and kiss again. They look happy.

Minho wants to take the glass lamp by his elbow and haul it at their heads.

Gally’s feet shift in his lap as he stirs, and when Minho turns to look over Gally is staring right back at him.

He says, “You see them, too, yeah?”

Minho responds, “Go back to sleep.”

 

   vii.   

He is better the next night, thank goodness. The fever is gone and his face has regained a lot of the colour it lost, so Minho feels no qualms about sliding into bed and burrowing himself into the sheets like a small animal, one of his legs strewn over between Gally’s knees and the other thrown lazily around his waist. Gally stiffens, his arms hovering an inch above from touching Minho as if he isn’t completely sure how to proceed with this situation.

Gally lightly clears his throat, “I thought I was contagious?”

Minho presses his face more into the pillow, “Shut up. Sleep.”

He manages a minute of blissful silence, all the tension in Gally’s body relaxing as he takes the time to familiarise himself with the feeling of Minho’s body pressed against him, for different reasons than the usual.

And then, “Hey.”

Minho feels a light poke to his hip. He ignores him.

“Hey, Minho.”

With a sigh, Minho allows his eyelids to flutter open reluctantly, “What is it?”

Gally’s face, very close to his own, is grinning, his green eyes dark in the low light and near twinkling like some kind of fucking fairytale. Minho looks away.

“Guess what,” Gally says.

“What?”

The poking returns in the form of light drumming against Minho’s hip that tickles, which Gally knows, and what Gally says next is, “You like me.”

And.

Like the impenetrable steel fortress that he is, Minho’s reaction is obviously a beat of silence and unintelligible stuttering. Gally’s smile only widens. Minho frowns, fortifying himself, and says, “I think your fever might be back, you’re delirious.”

Gally snorts and presses his face into Minho’s neck. Minho can feel his lips move against his skin, and his breath sends tremors through his body and leaves goosebumps behind when he talks, “Whatever helps you sleep at night, baby.”

His arms tighten around Minho’s waist, keeping him close, and locks an ankle around his own. He is warm, though not fever heat, thankfully, but perhaps even worse – like home, like safety, like everything that Minho fears most but wants so desperately.

Heart hammering in his chest, Minho snuggles closer, telling himself it is solely because of the night’s chill, and the house’s thermostat taking too long to boot up.

 

   viii.   

(Late at night, when he presses himself against the mattress like he wants to disappear into it, hands over his ears, balls of hair clutched in his fists so hard they spring tears to his eyes; when Others are poking and prodding and shoving at his body with their icy hands, cold against his skin where they touch him. Their voices whisper in his ear, smothering his senses and threatening to consume him, scoop him up and swallow him whole, Minho thinks about the look on Gally’s face after he’s kissed him, open and hopeful and filled with awe, and counts the hands leaving his skin one by one.)

 

   ix.

(He thinks, above all, he might be scared of Gally the most.)

  

   x.

Minho curses softly under his breath, watching the flames slowly engulf Thomas’ house in the rearview mirror. He’s becoming itchy at the proximity, impatient to leave, and keeps a close eye on everyone who is left bustling about in the background, collecting essentials and personal possessions, tossing them into cars with not a care to whom they belong to. The bed of Thomas’ light blue pick-up is full of miscellaneous shit people decided they couldn’t live without.

Behind him, Gally gives the trunk one firm push against everything packed in there like Tetris blocks. Minho watches him around the side and practically collapse in the driver’s seat, the collar of his black shirt wet with sweat.

“Shit,” he spits, adjusting the mirror, “It’s getting wild, we need to get the fuck out fast.” He swears again, and Minho silently agrees. “ _Shit_. Fucking psychopaths,” Gally continues, tapping anxiously at the wheel before sticking his head out the window to yell at Fry and Clint to hurry up, “Could have at least given everyone some kind of warning before torching the _entire fucking forest_.”

He squeezes his eyes shut and presses down on the horn, hard and loud. Frypan glares in their direction and flips them off.

Minho’s eyebrow raises, concerned. The incessant swearing is usually the first sign of a panic attack brewing on the horizon. Minho looks over at him, “Gally?”

“I don’t know if I can drive right now.”

“Move over.”

They switch seats. Minho passes Gally a bottle of water and orders him to sip, which he does, visibly calmer already, settled into the passengers seat. He rubs at his mouth, sitting the bottle up on the dashboard.

Minho allows his palm to rest against Gally’s on the centre console, interlocking their fingers loosely, knowing they have all of three minutes maximum before the others slide into the back seat. 

“You alright?” He asks.

Gally nods and smiles, stiff and sheepish, “Yeah. Thanks.”

“Good.”

Minho ends up grabbing the water bottle just to fiddle with it while they wait, keeping an anxious eye on the fire at their backs. He sees Thomas whisper something into Newt’s ear, sees him nod before climbing up into the truck. To his left Aris and Sonya jump in Harriet’s car as she revs the engine, obviously just as restless to leave as they are. Teresa, Brenda and Teddy jump into the bed of Thomas’ truck, Chuck in the front between them.

Gally’s voice breaks him out of his thoughts, “Do you remember learning how to drive?”

Minho beeps the horn once, impatiently, before answering, “Nope.”

“Doesn’t that bother you?”

“I try not to think about it.”

Gally huffs and shakes his head unbelievably. “Amazing. How do you do it? How do you just … ignore everything? How does it not get to you?”

Minho closes his eyes. “It does get to me,” he says, “A lot more than you think.”

A Minho knocks on the window beside his head. He wants it to walk into the flames and perish.

“I mean I’ve …” Gally shuffles in his seat, “I’ve heard you talking in your sleep sometimes. So I know you Dream. How have you never even come close to getting lost?”

 _I think about you_ , he doesn’t say. _I think about you and the sound of your voice and it pulls me out of the dark_. He thinks about Thomas, and that overwhelming need to protect. About Newt, and how Minho needs to be here and alive and not an overcooked BBQ steak to make sure he doesn’t screw himself over again. About Brenda and Teresa and Chuck and Fry and everyone he gives even an ounce of shit about.

Because Gally has already lost Ben and he doesn’t need to lose Minho, too.

Thomas drives past to the front to await everyone, and he says, “Because I love you, okay?” and looks over at Gally’s wide-eyed, tongue-tied expression, and realises he’s asking for permission.

Clint and Fry are approaching now but Minho pays them no mind, focussed on Gally’s mouth opening and closing, beginning a sentence and stopping it. His palms sweat as slowly Gally nods.

It’s true. He doesn’t remember how long it’s been true, but it is.

A group of Minhos flicker in and out of existence with jarring, jerking movements. Eventually, they turn towards the flames, and quietly, still as statues, watch it. This is the first time they have been quiet for months.

This town will burn and they will burn right along with it.

Gally smiles softly.

“Say it again.”

 

 

*

**Author's Note:**

> You can find me on [tumblr](http://singt0me.tumblr.com/) here.


End file.
